Thursday, October 2, 2014

Using Advanced Organizers with 4th Graders

An example of an Advanced Organizer for chapter 5.

At one site where I work, students are having difficulty comprehending the text, The Iroquois: The Six Nations Confederacy (Mary Engler). In addition to a density of facts, the text is not well written and I suspect one might argue does not represent the complexity of the Iroquois people very well. The text is included in the Grade 4 module from Expeditionary Learning.

In order to help facilitate comprehension, I introduced teachers to the use of advanced organizers. An explanation of advanced organizers, along with organizers for each of the chapters (2 - 5) is included in the slideshare below. Please use freely.